


Justajoo

by esperante



Category: Luck by Chance (2009), Rang De Basanti | Paint It Saffron (2006)
Genre: F/F, F/M, Gen, Stealth Crossover
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2011-11-12
Updated: 2011-11-12
Packaged: 2017-10-26 00:10:24
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,643
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/276387
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/esperante/pseuds/esperante
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
      <p>A rough glossary for all the Hindi dialogues has been provided at the end.</p>
    </blockquote>





	Justajoo

**Author's Note:**

  * For [s_k](https://archiveofourown.org/users/s_k/gifts).



> A rough glossary for all the Hindi dialogues has been provided at the end.

**NOVEMBER 2006**

It’s that time of the year again, when her fingers and the tip of her nose feel permanently frozen. Cursing Delhi in December, Sonia arrives early at the dhaba, and finds Aslam stationed at their usual spot, steam curling up from his cup of tea.

She takes a deep breath, cold morning air stinging her throat, mixed with the smells of frying eggs and Aslam’s cigarette. He sees her, and offers her a smile. There’s a comfort in it, in the heat of his shawl, as she slips her hands under it, and leans her head against his bony shoulder.

“Lines yaad kar li?”

He turns and raises one supercilious eyebrow at her, and she laughs. “Right, forgot who I was talking to, shaayar sahab.”

Aslam grins at her, and turns away to exhale, a plume of white smoke tall in the air. “How come you're here so early? Should I order chai?”

“Yes, please,” she says, yawning and watches Aslam unfold from the bench and lope towards Chandu bhaiyya. When he comes back, he drapes a corner of the shawl over her shoulders.

They sit for a while, quiet. Sonia lets the morning noises of the dhaba wash over her, follows the gentle rise and fall of Aslam’s breathing, the rustle of his newspaper.  Sonia thinks about the script folded in her bag, the faded saree that’s going to be her costume for today; and hopes the winter afternoon sunshine will be kind to them.

“Toh Aslam miya, you’re going to wow us today as well?”

He looks up, away from his newspaper. “Kya matlab?”

Sonia jostles him gently. “You know… last time, you and Laxman, that scene was just brilliant.”

The last shoot had been Ashfaq and Bismil’s scene as they planned their mission. DJ’s mother had offered them the space behind her dhaba – “Perfect,” Sonia had breathed, scanning the place with her hands on her hips as Sue quickly jotted down a list of props they would need – and what they hadn’t realised was that it would be the first time that Aslam would be left alone with Laxman and his barely leashed hostility without the buffer of a group of people.

But then, the two of them had been magic on screen – eyes brimming over with concern, worry, fondness; voices softening and cracking in their intensity, arms clasped like they’d been brothers for a lifetime. Later, as the group reconvened at the dhaba and sprawled on the jute-strung cots along the side of the highway, Sonia thought she could read an unspoken apology in the slump of Laxman’s shoulders, a tentative kindness seeping from the dimples that flashed in Aslam’s cheeks as he glanced over at Laxman from time to time, subtly including him in the general chatter about their day.

“All I’m saying is, you two were good. Like, really good,” Sonia tells him, and Aslam tilts his head at her.

“Sometimes people surprise you,” he says.

Sonia smiled to herself. “Sometimes you surprise yourself, no?”

*

 **APRIL 2006**

Sue was drunk, happy and warm, curling into Sonia’s side as she giggled softly.

“Take _good_ care of her, I’m telling you!” DJ had said at the door of their room, and Sonia had rolled her eyes at him till he went away, muttering and scratching at the top of his head. She had no doubt that the boys would carry on with their carousing, and there’d be more than one mishap that Aslam and Sukhi would recount to her. As if DJ was one to tell anyone to take care.

“This movie is going to be sooooo good, Sonia, I can feeeel it,” Sue whispered to the skin of Sonia’s neck. Her hand was on Sonia’s stomach, moving absently, and all of a sudden Sonia had to breathe deep to calm her racing heart, and try and decipher Sue’s next words.

“And I can’t – I can’t tell you how much it means to me.”  Sue’s accent thickened as she got drunk, and she was embarrassingly maudlin and clingy. Sonia had threatened Karan’s leather jacket to stop him from making fun of Sue the first time this had happened.

“It means so bloody much, and I love you Sonia,” Sue slurred, and Sonia’s insides clenched. She breathed deep again, in the strawberry smell of Sue’s hair. “You’re the best friend everrr and I loooove you, can we be mates forever?”

Sonia sighed, and pressed a kiss to Sue’s forehead in the dark. Sue was a friend, she was _drunk_ , and if DJ ever found out he would kill Sonia, she had no doubts about that at all.

“Forever, Sue,” Sonia said, “Now go to sleep,” and Sue snuggled in closer, humming with contentment. She fell asleep right away, but Sonia couldn’t, no matter how hard she tried, thoughts spiralling away from her.

* 

 **NOVEMBER 2006**

“Arey, obviously we are all good at this acting-shacting.” For a moment, Aslam’s gaze is unfocused, mind obviously a million miles away. Then he comes back to Sonia. “Aren’t we all paidayishi nautankibaaz? Even Karan.”

Sonia sticks her tongue out at him, and laughs; it huffs out white in the space between them.

“No, Aslam, listen to me na. You paint, you write poetry _and_ you’re an amazing actor,” she says, and digs an elbow into his side. “Aur kya rang dikhaoge?”

“Aage aage dekho, hota hai kya,” Aslam parries, mouth quirking up on one side. “But seriously, I wasn’t alone in that scene, yaar. Laxman did a great job too.”

“Hmm, he did.” Sonia steals a piece of anda bhurji off of Aslam’s plate, chewing as she makes a split second decision to go ahead, coax Aslam to talk about it. “So you and Laxman…”

Aslam fixes her with a hard look, waiting for her to finish.

“…are not enemies now.”

Sonia and Aslam have been friends ever since that first class together in the film studies course; good enough that they know what the other leaves unsaid, long enough that they know each other’s limits.

“He was never my enemy,” he replies, soft and hushed in the morning calm.

Aslam smiles at the disbelief Sonia’s sure is written all over her face. “I don’t expect you to understand… you, DJ, Sukhi and Karan have always jumped in to defend me against him, and he’s been nothing but a… troublemaker, but I don’t – I never actively hated him, or wished him dead. I simply never wanted him around… Moonh nahi lagna chahta tha.”

Sonia remains silent, and Aslam sighs, “I’m not explaining this right, Sonia, but theek hai, I don’t expect anyone to understand, just… jaane de? We’re working together now, and he’s stopped behaving like an idiot… so it’s fine, just accept that.”

“Haan, that happens, sometimes you have to accept things even if you don’t fully understand them,” Sonia says, stealing more bhurji. Aslam looks at her sceptically.

*

 **MARCH 2003**

“I’ve kissed a woman,” Sonia gritted out, and her fists curled in irritation when Ajay didn’t stop laughing. “Why can’t you just accept that?”

“What the hell, you guys have really wild parties, huh!” He snorted, and calmed down a second later. “Okay, okay, sorry baba, why are you getting so serious?”

Why was she getting so -- Sonia had to remind herself that they were sitting in the motorcycle shed behind her hostel; that it was two in the morning and she had _sneaked_ out to meet Ajay and if they were loud and if the watchman wandered past them, she was _done_.

“Because it’s not funny, Ajay,” she said lowly, voice almost a growl.

“Okay, okay, I’m sorry,” he whispered back. “Okay, fine, who was she?”

Sonia forced herself to say, “Her name is Akanksha,” and then it was almost like she couldn’t control herself, the words were pouring out from where she’d suppressed them all in her ribcage, where she'd hidden them even from her oldest best friend from school. “She _was_ my roommate last year, I liked her a lot and we used to kiss and fool around and then she said she had a boyfriend and asked for a roommate transfer this year. Okay?”

Ajay looked thunderstruck, and Sonia heard a rushing noise in her ears. “Say something,” she muttered, preparing to get up and leave.

“Wait, wait, you kissed a woman on _purpose_?”

“You asshole,” Sonia heard herself hiss, and stood up, brushing her pyjamas off. “You stupid… macho… air force _asshole!_ ” __

“I’m sorry, Sonia, I don’t get it…” Ajay whispered furiously, getting up with her, “If you like women then what about me?”

Sonia shoved at his chest, afraid of lashing out like she really wanted to, needing him to get out of her way. “I don’t understand either, okay? I liked her, and I love you and I don’t always _understand_ it either,” she choked out, and ran back to her room.

A week later, flower bouquets were littered around Sonia’s hostel room, and Ajay had written her the sweetest letter - _”… you said you loved me, and that’s all I need. Because I love you so much, more than anything in the world and I promise to always stay faithful to you, and always be honest with you. All I really want is for you to promise me the same.”_

Three years later, in a rare moment of calm, Sukhi told her that he’d seen Ajay slip a ring box into his pocket. Sonia smiled to herself all through the drive, and didn’t think twice before saying yes to him.

*

 **NOVEMBER 2006**

Aslam is rubbing his palm against his arm; it’s his habit when he’s nervous or uncomfortable. In the summers, when clad in his black ganji, Aslam’s fingers would play with the taweez sometimes bound around his bicep; now, passing over three layers of clothing, his fingers are restless, searching for an anchor.

Sonia takes this as a sign to push ahead. All she really knows is that in three years, she has never once seen Aslam express serious intent for any girl of their acquaintance, but always quote shayari for some unknown, idealised _malika_ ; that there had been Rauf in their first year and Sandeep in their second, men that Aslam intensely engaged with and always grew frustrated - heartbroken, Sonia suspects– with; that Aslam’s quiet, burning focus on Laxman is something similar, something perhaps reciprocated. And after all these years, perhaps _she_ is ready to have this conversation with Aslam.

“No, Aslam, I get it, I really do – sometimes you can’t understand why you are the way you are about –“

“Why I am the way I am? Sonia, soch ke bol.”

Aslam’s tone is one Sonia has never heard addressed to her, and even within the warm cocoon of her sweater, his shawl and the heat of his body, something about it chills her to the bone.

“Mera matlab ye hai ki, I _understand_  that there are some things you think about which are not very acceptable, but you feel that --”

“I am Muslim,” Aslam cuts in sharply, “and people like Laxman Pandey hate us and say they want to kill us, Sonia. How can you understand that?”

For a minute, Sonia is simply dumbstruck. She stares at Aslam, who softens in the face of her silence.

“That’s – that’s not –” she manages to say, eventually. “That’s not what I meant, Aslam, I’m sorry…”

Aslam sighs, “You want to know why I don’t hate him because of what he’s been like to me, and why I am being civil to him, right? You mean why am I being _weak_ ,” he says, bitterly. Sonia cringes, remembering all the insults Aslam’s family have heaped on him just for being friends with her, DJ, Karan and Sukhi and not good Muslim boys.

“No, Aslam –”

“It’s because I can’t deal with the hate and anger beyond a point,” he says, fingers clasped around his bicep. “I get enough of it at home, and I can’t live like that, all the time. Laxman is behaving better, I am happy and I will encourage that. If he does do something… I know you guys are there,” Aslam says, and attempts a smile.

“We’re there for you, hundred percent, I swear,” Sonia tells him, fervent, and puts her arms around his waist to give him a quick hug.

“I know,” Aslam says, and this time his smile is genuine.

“Abey oye! Ajay pe cheating ho rahi hai ye toh!”

Aslam laughs as Sonia turns around to yell a curse back at Sukhi. Her voice effectively shatters the quiet morning – Chandu bhai turns the TV volume up and the dhaba is bustling with people; the weak winter sun comes out and one by one they all troop in, laughing, chattering, Sukhi with the script in his hands, begging people to run lines with him; DJ with a couple of oranges in his hands that he starts to peel when he sits down, Karan with his perpetual smirk on his face as he chats with Aslam, and Sue, happy Sue, who always takes a minute to look around at them and share a look of wonder over it all with Sonia.

*

 **NOVEMBER 2011**

Years later, Sonia thinks of that morning sometimes. How happy they were, how naïve to think that all they needed was each other. How she will never, in all her career or even all her life, make anything more fulfilling or meaningful than that 90 minute movie. Sue writes to her sometimes; she says she has never watched that film again.  

She never did have that conversation with Aslam; he died, hand in hand with Laxman, and the finality of that is enough for Sonia. She tries not to think of them all too much, her friends, her _life_ snatched away from her one spring morning; and thinks of Aslam telling her that she isn’t weak for doing that, for moving on.

Years later, in Bombay, she sits in on a set for a new TV show and goes over her script with the actors, discussing characters and figuring out the dialogues. Sonia’s eye keeps straying to the woman playing Haaniya, clearly more intelligent than the rest, and something about the curve of her neck sets Sonia’s pulse racing like it hasn’t in many years.

“Okay, so that would be Haaniya’s reaction to her father?” the woman – Sona Mishra, Sonia won’t forget that name, considering how easy it is to confuse it with her own –  asks in her not quite Mumbaiyya accented English.

“Yeah. Her father isn’t happy about her being friends with non-Muslims, but she manages to placate him and do what she wants anyway.”

"Ah," she says, beaming at Sonia, and Sonia finds herself helplessly grinning back.

Sonia hangs around during the shoot, watching Sona bring her character to life.

“It’s a little rough around the edges, no?” Sona asks, coming up to her after the shoot.

“Hmm… haan, but it’s no problem, we can talk about it. You’re really good, by the way. On camera, I mean.”

Sonia loves it already, how Sona’s face flows into a lovely, pleased smile. Actors love being complimented, after all. And this time around, Sonia knows exactly why she’ll keep showering Sona with them.

Sona holds out a hand – it’s cold to the touch, startling Sonia.

“Oh, sorry… I’ve always had cold hands. Ma used to try and make me eat paalak, but,” Sona tells her, shrugging with a grimace.

“No, that’s fine, I always had cold hands in the winter. Arey, I’m from Delhi, where we actually have a winter season,” Sonia says, and that makes Sona laugh and tell her about Lucknow winters. As they walk out to her car, and later into Sona’s small apartment, Sonia _listens_ to the gorgeous woman beside her, lets herself imagine all the possibilities for once, and doesn’t think of heartbreak, yet.

 

**Author's Note:**

> Sona Mishra is a character played by the fantastic Konkona Sen Sharma in the 2009 movie [Luck By Chance](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Luck_By_Chance).
> 
> \--
> 
>  **Glossary**
> 
> "Lines yaad kar li?" - Learnt your lines?  
> Shaayar sahab - Roughly, Senor Poet  
> "Toh Aslam miya" - "So, Mr. Aslam"  
> "Kya matlab?" - "What do you mean?"  
> "Paidayishi Nautanki-baaz" - roughly, born drama queens.  
> "Aur kya rang dikhaoge?" - roughly, "What other talents/hidden qualities will you reveal?"  
> "Aage aage dekho, hota hai kya" - "Keep watching, see what happens."  
> Anda bhurji - spiced, scrambled eggs  
> Malika - literally, "Queen", used here to indicate a poetic ideal woman.  
> "Moonh nahi lagna chahta" - a way of saying, "I don't want to engage with him."  
> "Soch ke bol" - "Think before you speak."  
> "Mera matlab yeh hai ki" - "What I mean is"  
> "Ajay pe cheating ho rahi hai ye toh!” - "This looks like you're cheating on Ajay!"
> 
> \--


End file.
